As toothbrush design has evolved in an effort to improve cleaning of teeth and gums, the complexity of toothbrushes and their functions have increased. Powered toothbrushes are one example of efforts to improve tooth cleaning by including one or more movable sets of cleaning elements. Another approach to improving cleansing of teeth is use of a toothbrush head that is articulated or segmented to better follow the rounded curvature of teeth aligned in the human jaw.
Marketing such toothbrush improvements, however, has its problems. More specifically, toothbrushes typically are sold in sealed packaging to prevent dirt and germs from reading the toothbrush before use. One type of such packaging is blister packaging which is typified by a transparent, thermoformed shell largely molded to the shape of the object being sold which is made of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), polystyrene or cellulosic plastics. That transparent shell is typically sealed to an underlying hardboard card containing product information and promotional material.
Sealed packaging, such as blister packs, however, separate the consumer from the product. Where features of the product are not readily evident by merely looking at the packaging, it can be difficult to market those features to the consumer. Accordingly, some manufacturers have attempted to provide means in the packaging to operate features of their product that are best understood when in operation.
One example of this approach is packaging which enables actual operation of powered toothbrushes even though sealed in their packaging. Examples of this approach are U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,189,693 B1 and 6,371,294 B1 issued to Blaustein et al. They disclose a blister pack with a prominent display on the front thereof which contains an arrow pointing to a button and invites the potential customer to “Try Me” (See FIG. 8 of Blaustein et al. patents). If the customer follows this invitation the blister pack is depressed which in turn activates the on-off switch on a power toothbrush. Thus, a potential customer can actually observe the operation of the powered portions of the toothbrush through transparent portions of the packaging overlying these portions of the toothbrush.
Another patent disclosing means for activation of a power toothbrush at the point-of-purchase while maintaining the sealed condition of its packaging, is U.S. Pat. No. 6,311,837B1 also issued to Blaustein et al. This patent discloses a small recess 26 in the blister packaging aligned with the on-off switch of the powered toothbrush. In operation, the toothbrush can be temporarily energized at the point-of-sale by pressing the recess 26 down until it contacts the on-off switch. When pressure on the recess 26is released, the switch returns to its original position and the power is deactivated (See column 4, lines 19–41).
While pushing down on a portion of package may permit operation of a button operated powered device such as a toothbrush, that approach will not suffice where the features of the device are not operable by the simple push of a button. This invention discloses means of allowing consumer implementation of product features that are not readily susceptible to push button operation.